The Oklahoman’s sports columnist Berry Tramel offers this list of five favorite baseball novels, which does not contain many of the “usual suspects.”
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From the category archives:
Fiction
Rapid Robert turned 90 on Nov. 3. Feller was one of those players from “the greatest generation” — including Ted Williams, Warren Spahn, Bob Buhl, Hank Greenberg, Joe DiMaggio and many others — who lost precious years to the service of their country. Yes, some, like Feller and Williams, were on the front lines while […]
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From the One Minute Book Reviews blog, this mini-rev of a cuh-lassic. Upshot: “…written for adults but likely also to appeal to many teenagers.”
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MyrtleBeachOnline’s sports columnist Sean Horgan offered a list of 20 great sports books, including the following baseball titles, listed in his order: The Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, (Bill James, 1986) This book changed the way many people looked at baseball, encompassing history, anecdotes and statistical analysis. The Great American Novel (Philip Roth, 1973) Roth […]
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Talk about sub-genres. How about a baseball mystery novel? This review comes from Mystery-Books.com. Upshot: Fans of baseball novels will undoubtedly be thrilled with Green Monster and overlook the flaws that make this mystery no better than average. Talk about damning with faint praise…
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Kidliterate.com published this review of Alan Gratz’s latest. Gratz also wrote Samurai Shortstop, a young adult/historical fiction book on baseball at a Japanese school in the late 19th century. Visit Gratz’s Web site.
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From Texas Pages, which provides information about writers, books and events in the Lone Star state, the following announcement: * Forced Out, by Stephen Frey (Atria, $24.95). Follows a baseball scout, player and mafia hitman as their destinies converge.
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From the New Haven Review, this lengthy critique by Peter Ephross of this overlooked classic by Eliot Asinof.
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from the Scooter Chronicles blog. Upshot: As far as baseball books go, I can see why this ranks amongst the best. I don’t know from experience, or from reading anyone that has said so, but I get the feeling that it’s a very accurate description of what life could have been like playing for a […]
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In the current issue of ESPN The Magazine, Rick Reilly writes about a high school pitcher who deliberately threw at a home plate umpire, instructing his catcher to let the ball go on through. You can read that piece here. The scenario is eerily reminiscent of a scene from Philip Roth’s The Great American Novel […]
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by Frank Nappi. St. Martin’s Press I don’t ordinarily read baseball fiction aimed at the young adult demographic. Most are simply rehashes of the same story: young athlete, usually a star, faces adversity in the form of another player on his own team or a health crises or another at-home situation; learns valuable lessons, yada-yada-yada; […]
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My review of Mike Lupica’s latest title for “young adult” readers (there’s something inaccurate about that designation; a young adult should probably be in his/her late teens or early twenties, depending on state laws, not the intended audience of 12-16 year-olds. I’m just sayin’.): Mike Lupica, the veteran sports columnist for the Daily News in […]
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I’m surprised Peter Golenbock’s ribald tale of Mickey Mantle hasn’t hit the remaindered bin yet. Lasorda’s I Live for This got the treatment just a few months after it published. Anyway, here an excerpt from the audio book as read by Alan Smithee. http://audible.edgeboss.net/download/audible/content/bk/pnix/000053/bk_pnix_000053_sample.mp3Podcast: Play in new window | DownloadSubscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
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As reviewed on Stltoday.com, a St. Louis-based web site. The End of Baseball is a Bill Veeck-inspired historical fiction, which is on my shelf for near-future reading. Upshot: Mainly, as somebody in baseball puts it, “The End of Baseball” sails straight down central. As somebody else in baseball used to say, it’s a winner.
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Time to play catch-up again. From Great Britain’s Guardian, this article about Billy Beane and the Moneyball phenomenon. Why on earth would it appear in a British paper? Because Beane is “Tottenham Hotspur fanatic, as well as a fan of the team’s coach, Sir Alex Ferguson. A list of recommended baseball novels from the Campaign […]
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is available on Amazon.com,
* Simply the best
December 2, 2008
Spitball Magazine just announced the finalists for the 2008 CASEY Award, Almost a Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the 1980 Phillies, by William Kashatus (University of Pennsylvania Press) Neil Leifer: Ballet in the Dirt: The Golden Age of Baseball, by Neil Leifer (Taschen) (See here for samples.) Baseball’s Greatest Hit: The Story of “Take […]
Tagged as: baseball literary awards, Spitbal
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